The One Bite At a Time Principle

On of the best ways to become financially free is to have residual income coming in from several sources.

Perhaps easier said then done. You hear it all the time, "I can't afford to join a whole bunch of companies now" or "It's to hard to promote several companies at once".

Remember the old riddle about how do you eat an elephant. You know the answer, "one bite at a time."

Lets use the one bite at a time principle to create multiple streams of residual income. We will use network marketing companies to do so.

Residual income is income that you create once, and then it keeps coming to you on a regular basis. It is a way you can leverage your time and investment. You work to build the income, which takes marketing time. It may take a monetary investment, depending on whether you are using free or paid marketing methods.

Here we are defining network marketing companies as those programs that have a monthly cost on which they pay a monthly commission. It is this monthly commission that will provide you with long term residual income.

Affiliate programs are not the same. They are usually a one time sale. Some do offer multiple products, but you cannot count on continued sales for residual income.

This is not to say that you can't make money with affiliate programs. You can make money with them. They just don't fit real well with the one bite at a time principle.

Most network marketing companies pay their highest percents on the lower levels, like levels five and lower. They pay quite low percents on levels one and two. They justify this by saying you have very few members on level one and two and a great many (eventually) on the lower levels, so their program is maximizing your income. That might well be true, but only after you have built a very large organization. That could take months or years.

Other network marketing companies pay a high percentage on level one or two. Their philosophy is to help you get a decent check fairly soon. A few pay around 33% of the selling price on level one. If you receive 33% for everyone on your first level you will be breaking even with just three members on your first level.

These are hard to find, however they are out there. Check out the company as best you can. Check if the product or service has real value. If it looks good, then join it. Your goal is to recruit enough members so that you are breaking even.

If you are on a tight budget, don't worry about anything except your first company. Just promote it until you are breaking even. Use your favorite marketing method(s) to introduce people to your program. I'm not going to go into the different marketing methods in this article, however I have addressed this subject in some of my other articles. You can read them at http://www.the-home-business-center.com/articles.php.

When you are at break even in your first program you need to do three things.

First is to continue to promote the program. From here on out any new people will put you into profit, and you are on your way to building a residual income in that company.

Second, you need to work with the people that you have sponsored. Let them know what you are doing to sponsor members. Answer questions they have, or pass the questions on to your up line if necessary. Support your people to the best of your ability. You cannot be truly successful without them also being successful. (Really, you should be doing this starting as soon as a new member joins.)

Third, start looking for your next company. It should meet the same criteria as your first company. When you find it, go and join it. Then, add it to your marketing promotions. So now you are marketing two programs. It should be easier to start marketing this second program, as you will have more marketing experience then when you first started.

When you are at break even, start the process over again. Keep doing it until you have five or six programs in which you are making money. By the time you have the fifth program working good you should be making a fair income on the first programs.

Five or six programs are a good number to stop and stay with. At this point devote your time to supporting these programs and youre down line in them. Continue to study marketing. When you find something that works good pass it along to your down line.

You have now established several residual income streams. You did it with a fairly small investment. And is not hard to support the various programs because you built up to where you are gradually. You did it all one bite at a time.